Big Names Still Seeking Out Jody Linscott's Percussion Talent

LOS ANGELES — Not all that long ago, Jody Linscott was working as a waitress at a London club while learning to play a battered bongo drum in her spare time.

Today Linscott is one of the most high-profile percussionists in the business, and is currently touring with Roger Daltrey.

The Boston native's musical career began when she was living in London after high school, making ends meet by repairing household items while attending classes in bookbinding.

"Somebody gave me this small conga drum to fix, but they never came back to pick it up," she recalled recently. "Then, I saw this ad for a special class at the Africa Center taught by a master drummer from Ghana. So I thought I'd bring my little drum."

Linscott went to the class and spontaneously began beating out rhythms in tandem with the African drummer.

"Eventually, he stopped what he was doing and came over and said, `You answered my call. How did you know what to do?' " Linscott said with a smile. "So, I started taking lessons with him at his home. He used to hug me and tap these rhythms really hard on my back and I'd (repeat) them on drums.

"I went to his house three times for lessons. The fourth time, he was dressed in these white robes, had a talking drum under his arm, proposed marriage and started chasing me around the room. I couldn't really go back after that."

But Linscott had been bitten by the bug and took a waitress job at Dingwall's Dancehall, a London club that specialized in the homegrown funky R&B music that swept the city in the early '70s.

"When the bands played, I'd bring my drums up on stage and play with the musicians," Linscott said. "One night, this group called Kokomo came to play and I stayed with them on stage for their entire set. Dingwall's fired me and Kokomo hired me about a month later."

Kokomo, consisting of such highly regarded players as bassist Alan Spenner and guitarists Neil Hubbard and Jim Mullen, was taken under the wing of Pink Floyd's management and landed a deal with Columbia Records.

Linscott, who is in her late 30s and lives in London with her two children, has toured or recorded with David Gilmour, Tom Jones, the Who, Pete Townshend and Elton John as well as Daltrey.

A few years ago, Linscott began writing books for children. She and co-author Claudia Porges Holland have had two volumes-"Once Upon A-Z" and "The Worthy Wonders Lost at Sea"-published by Doubleday, both edited by the late Jackie Onassis.